Monaco's Royal Family Welcomes Regal Addition

Princess Caroline of Hanover, right, and her eldest son Andrea Casiraghi, attend the opening of the Christmas village in Monaco, in this file photo dated Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2012. A baby boy is the latest addition to this jet set royal family, it is announced Friday March 22, 2013, born to Andrea Casiraghi and his Colombian fiancee heiress Tatiana Santo Domingo. Mother and child are understood to be in good health. (AP Photo/Lionel Cironneau, file)
(AP2012)

A baby boy is the latest addition to the jet setting royal family of Monaco.

On Friday the palace issued a statement saying Princess Caroline's eldest son Andrea Casiraghi and his Colombian fiancee have welcomed their first child.

In the statement, which didn't mention the baby's name, the Monaco palace said Princess Caroline is overjoyed at the arrival of her first grandchild. The statement said both the child and mother, heiress Tatiana Santo Domingo, are in good health.

It was announced last July that Casiraghi and Santo Domingo were engaged, but they have not yet fixed a date for the wedding.

Andrea Casiraghi is the nephew of Monaco's ruling sovereign, Prince Albert II. Known as a notorious ladies man, Albert long eschewed marriage. Many in Monaco had resigned themselves to forever having a bachelor prince. The constitution was even modified to ensure the continuity of the Grimaldi line, in the event that Albert never produced an heir.

The prince has acknowledged having fathered two children out of wedlock, but only his legitimate offspring would be able to succeed him. Albert ended decades of bachelorhood in 2011 when he married South African Olympic swimming champion Charlene Wittstock.

The last wedding of a ruling prince in Monaco prior to that was in 1956, when Hollywood star Grace Kelly married Prince Rainier III - Albert's mother and father.